Post by Kriyaban on Oct 3, 2022 17:36:56 GMT
Miraval is a tiny village in the Cabardès, some twenty miles north of the walled
city of Carcassonne. It is an astonishingly beautiful place, set in an intimate
valley and bounded by oceans of bright green bushes and trees, full of fragrance
and birdsong. Above a small waterfall in the River Orbiel, which has carved out
this place, but still in the depth of the valley, is a stone parapet, largely
overgrown, part of three surviving walls of the tower of Miraval’s ancient castle.
It is not the kind of impregnable stronghold associated with kings; it does not
need to be. Nature has provided the best defenses for this region. A small plaque
in the language of the region, Occitan (hence La Langue d’Oc), placed at the
base of the mound on which the castle was built, informs us that here was born
Raimon de Miraval, poet of love and honor. He was born between 1160 and
1165 and died sometime between 1216 and 1229.
According to his Provençal vida, Raimon de Miraval was “a poor knight of
the Carcassès, who owned a fourth part of the castle of Miraval.” The castle was
taken by Frankish crusaders against the Cathars in either 1211 or two years
earlier, when Béziers was taken and the entire population of the city massacred.
This loss was certainly the coup de grâce for a family whose fortunes had
declined consistently over the previous centuries. Deeds show that the family
had had to renounce possessions around Castres and cede possessions in
Rouergue and feudal rights in the Larzac throughout the twelfth century. Goods
situated in the environs of Castres went to the viscount of Béziers and
Carcassonne, Rogier II, in 1174, when Miraval was a boy. This demand was
made on Guilhem de Miraval as punishment for warlike activity and brigandage.
In stanza 4 of his sirventès “Pos Peire d’Alvergn’a chantat” (Since Peire
d’Auvergne Sang), the troubadour known as the Monk of Montaudon scoffs at
Raimon’s poverty. He refers to Miraval’s failure to produce the customary fairs
at the beginning of each month due to his attending the courts of the Midi and
Spain as troubadour and courtier. Thanks to his castle, Miraval was able to play
the role in the courtly love process of vassal-possessor of a fief. He did this by
offering his castle to his lady, and this frequently. This symbolic gesture was
terribly important to Miraval. Miraval itself was for him more than a place, more
even than a home. In a wonderful canso addressed specifically to the lady
Azalaïs de Boissézon, he sang:
It is a new love which invites me
to serve her in such a manner
that at Miraval let there be firmly established
all the goodness of love and of sincere accord.
At Miraval his pen would catch fire:
At the bottom of my heart is born the flame
which leaves my lips when I sing,
and with it I set ablaze the ladies and lovers.
And my melodies are gentle and grave,
lovable, gracious and courteous;
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
and that is why one can learn them gladly.
So the one who is slow to love
on hearing my beautiful words
will hurry towards love.
14
Holding the castle also enabled him to affirm his quality as knight and author.
Compared to the great seigneurs of the region, he was indeed a poor chevalier
unable to equal their obligatory largesse. He still gave much nonetheless, and
Miraval, who had a spiritual outlook, might have considered his thoughts the
more noble because they were unrelated to material possessions.
Miraval enjoyed the favor of Raimon VI’s magnificent court of Toulouse and
was, with his few possessions, able to avoid extreme poverty. With the exception
of Audiart (his name for the count of Toulouse) and Pastoret (quite possibly
Raimon Rogier Trencavel, who at age fourteen in 1199 became the immediate
suzerain of Miraval), Miraval was able to address equally the great seigneurs of
his own land as well as those of Spain.
Miraval’s political role appears to have been discreet, and except for one
significant song from 1213, he makes no reference to the ferocious war with the
northern crusaders fought by the nobility of the Languedoc and of Aragon from
1209 (the Albigensian Crusade against the Cathars).
15 While his friend Raimon
VI was the soul of that resistance, Miraval does not appear to have written
sirventès against the crusade. It is possible that Raimon VI did not want outward
provocation but instead held out hopes for diplomacy. This may say something
of the political and diplomatic weight of the free words of troubadours.
According to L. T. Topsfield, it is likely that Raimon VI was against the
“inferior” political sirventès (being a politician himself), preferring the
troubadour dedicated to the art of courtly love.
16
It was in Miraval’s interest to
rise above dynastic quarrels, because he could, as a certain Villelmi jibed, have
three masters in a year. Miraval had accused Villelmi of moral poverty; Villelmi
accused Miraval of being a “goody-goody.”
THE LADIES IN HIS LIFE